Mirror Of God
by alternaurora
Summary: Castiel finally consents to showing Dean his wings. What Dean sees isn't quite what he expects.


An idea that popped into my head and demanded attention. No real timeframe, just established DeanCas. Hope you enjoy! Typical disclaimers apply. (also posted on AO3)

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><p>Dean sat on the hood of the Impala wrapped cozily around Castiel. The August heat and the angel's trench coat made his skin summer-damp, but Castiel was unaffected by the temperature so Dean didn't mention it. Castiel held Dean's hands in his, hugging their arms together against his chest, knees drawn up with his dress shoes flat against the paint. Dean didn't scold him for it. Baby could take a scuff or two if it meant they could stay like this for just a bit longer.<p>

A cool luscious breeze swept across the parking lot of the no-tell motel Dean and Sam were crashing at overnight, breaking their epic of a cross-country drive in two. The air kissed the heat from Dean's skin and he hummed at the small pleasure of it. The edge of Castiel's coat that lay open on the hood danced as the wind caught underneath it, making it flutter.

"How long can you stay?" Dean asked softly. He wondered if Castiel could feel the words tickle his ear.

Castiel held his gaze to the night sky, eyes darting about and forming the constellation Sagittarius in the blinking lights above. Dean knew the angel could see so much more than his own human eyes would ever allow. Where Dean saw a curious pattern of stars that resembled little more than an untouched connect-the-dots, he knew Castiel could see burning nebulae exploding throughout the birth and death of species, ancient galaxies, planets undiscovered that glittered with rings of majestic gold.

The angel made Dean feel small. He would not deny the truth in it. Holding a true creature of Heaven in his arms, snuggling him like a lazy koala— being permitted to love an angel was a humbling experience if he'd ever had one.

"Not long," Castiel said. "My brothers require my assistance." His voice was sorrowful but honest, unwilling to pull the wool over Dean's eyes.

"So what, like an hour?" Dean asked. He didn't even care if he sounded forlorn or hopeful or needy, he was damned thankful for whatever time they could steal away from it all. Castiel's duties in Heaven and Dean's life on the road with Sam as hunters… well, combined they didn't allow for much leisure. Each meeting was an effort, every moment a gift.

Castiel raised one of Dean's hands to his lips and ghosted a kiss onto his palm. "Perhaps longer. We shall see. You know how… how _time_ can be, Dean."

Dean treasured how every rumbling utterance of his name from the angel's lips was like a prayer. But he could not savor the sound now, not with the crushing reminder of the last time they had seen one another.

They had curled together beneath the motel sheets, each spent and drunk on the other's presence, blue eyes tethered to green. _'Don't go, Cas. I miss you so damn much when you leave,'_ Dean had pleaded, shameless, whispering words of longing into the angel's neck. _'I miss you more,'_ Castiel had countered, but it wasn't a lover's tease as Dean's laugh had assumed.

Castiel had traced his fingers down along the hunter's stubbled jaw and said the words that still haunted Dean every moment they were apart: _'Time in Heaven works much the same as it does in Hell.'_

Dean's days became Castiel's weeks. Dean's weeks were months, sometimes years for Castiel. Every moment on Earth that the angel was in Heaven, Dean knew Castiel experienced it exponentially greater. The yearning Dean had always seen in Castiel's eyes now made sense. It broke his heart.

Dean chased the truth away with a kiss to the small curl of dark hair at the nape of the angel's neck. The trench coat's collar brushed his chin as he pulled away.

"Thanks for sneaking away for me," Dean said. "I bet they're not too happy about it."

"No, they aren't," Castiel admitted. "Most angels are not understanding of the concept of personal priorities."

"Personal anything, I bet."

Castiel made a humored sound in the back of his throat. "That is true."

Dean pressed his forehead to the back of Castiel's neck and pulled his hands free, letting them snake up along the angel's arms and over his broad shoulders, down over his back. He lightly rubbed Castiel's shoulder blades, smiling to himself as the body beneath his touch grew more pliant.

"Maybe some day you won't have to fly away," Dean murmured absently, the thought ripped from his lips without consent as he massaged where he'd always imagined Castiel's wings would begin.

_"Dean,"_ Castiel's deep voice warned almost inaudibly.

"I know," Dean said with a forced, dark chuckle, lifting his head. "Can't blame a guy for trying."

Dean's fingertips curved up from where Castiel's shoulder blades met, peaking at the base of his neck and then swooping slowly down along the angel's back in mirrored arcs until his path was broken by his own thighs. He allowed his hands to rest there, kneading circles into Castiel's hips with his thumbs.

"Will I ever get to see them?" Dean asked. His voice was shaky and held little hope, as if it was a question he'd asked a thousand times, a question he'd ask a thousand times more.

Castiel bowed his head and exhaled loudly, unevenly.

Dean knew the answer that was coming. He'd heard it before: _'Dean, humans are not meant to perceive manifestations of Heaven's Grace,'_ or some other excuse sang to the same tune.

It varied, but it was always the same bottom line: _No._

Castiel raised his head back towards the heavens— not the ones he often called home, but man's imperfect interpretation projected onto the only remaining unknown. "I care for you too much to wish that upon you," he said.

Dean froze and immediately he knew that Castiel noticed his reaction to adding a new verse to their usual song and dance. He felt the angel go tense at every point of contact. Castiel turned his head and met Dean's wide-eyed stare over his shoulder.

"What the hell is that supposed to mean, Cas?" Dean asked breathlessly.

Castiel shifted on the hood of the Impala, turning between Dean's legs so that he was mostly facing the hunter. The trench coat's length bunched up and was lost beneath him.

"It is not impossible, Dean. I could show you, but…"

Dean encouraged Castiel's crestfallen face with the touch of two fingers beneath the angel's chin. "But what?"

Castiel's voice was rough and broken as he said: "You will not like what you see."

Dean swept his fingers from Castiel's chin along to the angel's cheek, letting his palm rest softly against the dark stubble there. "Shouldn't I get the chance to decide that for myself?" he asked.

A long moment passed with only the sounds of the nearby highway, the white noise a screaming quiet. "Are you certain this is what you want?" Castiel asked. "My wings, they are… not what one would expect."

Dean leaned forward and pressed his lips to the angel's mouth. "I want to see you, Cas, but only if you're ready to show me."

As the kiss broke, Castiel's eyes fluttered open and held wide at the unexpected turning of the tables, of having the decision reversed and handed back to him. Then his face softened, jaw slack and wide. "I'm ready," he said. "But not here."

Dean felt the static unearthly wave bathe him in the fabric of forbidden dimensions almost as soon as Castiel pressed his fingers to Dean's forehead. He felt ripped from his own body and shoved back into it with all of his particles and cells rearranged and recharged. His boots hit solid ground and he fell to his knees as the synapses in his brain struggled to reconnect, to allow his feeble human body to function. Castiel knelt over him, grasping his arms and roughly calling his name.

"Shit, I'll never get used to that," Dean said. He shook his head as his eyes came into focus and found the familiar face of his angel looking back at him.

"I apologize," Castiel said.

"I'm good, nothing to worry about. It's getting easier."

It was only as Castiel helped pull Dean to his feet that the hunter realized it was raining. The droplets were staining his already sweat-moistened shirt an even darker shade of gray. The water was cool, the air around him chilled more like that of a brisk autumn day instead of the sticky summer night they had just left. His body reflexively shivered and Castiel let his trench coat fall from his shoulders and wrapped it around Dean who shrugged into it without hesitation.

"I would increase the temperature, but I have already created a massive storm when one was not meant to occur. If I meddle any further, others may sense my interference and seek us out." Castiel wiped the water from Dean's brow with a tender touch. "The rain should stop shortly. I have already weakened it so our arrival would not be unpleasant."

"You _made_ a storm? Why?" Dean asked.

Castiel stood close to Dean and put a hand on his arm. "Watch," the angel said with the beginnings of an indulgent grin. He lifted his other hand to the horizon which hung dark with roiling black clouds. With a sharp twist of his hand, lightning struck.

Dean jerked back into Castiel's side at the loud unprecedented crack and booming thunder. The jagged bolt of electric might illuminated the sky in dusky shades of purple. Where it touched ground it inverted and doubled, almost as if it had struck the surface of a mirror.

Castiel pulled his hand in and the rain stopped. He put his fingers to Dean's chest and Dean felt himself dry instantaneously.

"Cas," Dean breathed the name in unabashed wonder. He could never put the fact from his mind that Castiel was a being of immense power, but seeing him manipulate the world around them always left him standing on trembling feet. "Where are we?" he asked.

"Bolivia."

"Why are we in Bolivia?"

Castiel slipped his fingers through Dean's and they began walking. The strange ground beneath them was slick with a coating of rainwater that clapped wetly with every step.

"This is one of my favorite places on Earth," Castiel explained as the thick storm clouds began to dissipate into nothing. "I wish that I could take credit for it's creation, but that honor belongs to Gabriel."

As they walked, the water splashing about their feet, Dean could see the stars begin to peek through the clouds. He allowed Castiel to continue his explanation.

"It is most commonly called Salar de Uyuni. This is not soil we are stepping on, Dean, but your planet's largest salt flat. It is a marvel in and of it's own right, but that is not why I have brought you here."

The clouds were gone. Huge glittering trails of blue and white light stretched across the vast impossible dark above them, timeless splashes of stars glowing brilliant and illuminating the night. On the ground they were immaculately mapped, not wanting in brilliance or number. Dean stared down at his feet to find that he and Castiel were standing in the stars. If the dim horizon did not show shadowed stretches of mountains bisecting the unearthly scene, he would have thought they'd been transported again to somewhere even more unreal.

"Holy shit," Dean said, the words coming unbidden from a true place of awe. "It's almost like—"

"A mirror," Castiel finished. He released Dean's hand and crouched low. He circled his fingertips in the thin sheen of water which rippled and distorted the reflected illusion. "Many refer to this place as the Mirror of God. I believe it is a fitting title."

"This is— well, it's fucking _beautiful_, I don't even know. It's awesome. But what does this have to do with your wings?"

Castiel stood, inhaling a deep breath as he met Dean's eyes. He reached for Dean, pulling him in close by the sleeves of his own trench coat. "I need you to understand something, something I am certain you already know, deep down. I am _fallen_. I may have found acceptance in Heaven once more, but what is done cannot be undone. I am still an angel, but I am no longer pure. I am not _favored_. The same touch of humanity that allows me to love you also makes me fear, makes me _anxious_. You may think less of me, but _please_, Dean, do not think less of yourself."

Before Dean could react, Castiel stepped a distance away from him and turned his back to the hunter. The angel let the suit jacket slip from his shoulders, pulled it from his arms, and tossed it onto the wet ground. Galaxies quaked and vanished beneath it. Dean tried to speak but could not find the words as Castiel untucked and unbuttoned his white shirt and dropped it alongside the jacket. There had been so much pain in the angel's eyes, a fear which Dean could not fathom and stole the voice from his throat.

"Close your eyes and do not open them until the light has faded," Castiel instructed. A beat passed before he asked, "Are you ready?"

"Yes," Dean managed to say, the word escaping as little more than air. His eyes were closed and his mind was racing as it tried to decipher Castiel's words, his body shaking from head to toe because _he was about to see Castiel's wings_.

The air around him thrummed with something sharp and tense, like a thousand live wires pulled taut. It was terrifying and invigorating but Dean tried to reason that it was probably just some sort of cosmic energy thing between the two planes, the one on which they stood and the one in which Castiel kept his wings. There was an explosive crack and a pure white light that hurt Dean's eyes even behind his clenched lids.

But then the light faded and Dean opened his eyes.

They were huge. Two massive feathered appendages sprouted from the bared shoulder blades which Dean had massaged only minutes ago, stretching up and out in regal presentation. Each wing was spread but bent slightly at the joints to provide shape. If they were stretched to their full wingspan they would have been a good twenty feet, Dean thought.

They were black. Dean wasn't expecting them to be black, but his mind couldn't even dwell on the ramifications of that particular detail because those huge black angel wings caught in the surface of the wet ground and reflected all around him, massive and breath-taking. If Castiel was at all self-conscious about his wings for whatever reason, displaying them here in the mirrored water made them grand and imposing and more striking than Dean had ever imagined they could be.

Dean's trembling body permitted him to take a step forward. The splash of water from the hunter's feet startled Castiel and the massive wings jerked reflexively upward and out in an intimidating display. Dean froze, his heart pounding in his chest.

"I'm sorry," Castiel said, voice unsteady and deep. "Please continue, if you wish."

The familiar voice dragged Dean back to reality. He was really here, standing in the middle of some salty desert in Bolivia, really staring at actual physical feathery angel wings. Dean took another step and the wings remained still. In his approach he studied them more intently, forcing the awe that was clogging his throat back down into his stomach. This was _Cas_, after all.

Some sections of the wings were clearly missing a stray feather, but sporadically enough that they wouldn't deny Castiel flight. A small amount of adjacent groups of feathers were cut at the tips in sharp angles in what must have been battle wounds, others bristly and singed down to the feather's shaft. _Burned_, Dean couldn't help thinking with a twist in his heart.

He continued steadily, step by step until he was close enough that he could reach out and touch Castiel's feathers, dark and shimmering like oil. But he didn't. He _wouldn't_. There was a monumental trust being offered and Dean wouldn't dare cross any boundaries that hadn't been willingly cleared for him.

"They weren't always black, were they?" Dean asked somberly because _something_ needed to be said, and, well… he didn't need to hear the angel's response to know it was true.

"Neither were Anna's, or Lucifer's," Castiel replied. The words were too heavy and particular to be a simple point of reference, of angelic trivia.

Dean fought not to scold Castiel for even thinking about comparing himself to that particular brother, but he bit his tongue. "That's why you thought I wouldn't like them, Cas? Because of the color?"

"In part."

"Just like Baby," Dean quipped weakly. "Black is awesome."

"It does offer a unique aesthetic," Castiel confirmed.

Dean reached out and set a palm between Castiel's wings, between his vessel's naked shoulder blades. He held his fingers close so as not to touch the small feathers that sprouted from the new, inhuman joints. The angel stiffened at first but eased into the touch. Dean was so close that he had to lift or turn his head to see a full wing. When he did, his eyes kept landing on straight sliced tips and scorched feathers.

"Wish I could find whoever landed those cuts and run 'em through with their own sword," Dean growled. Addressing the battle wounds was easy. There was no guilt there.

There was a faint rustle of feathers as Castiel's chest huffed, a weak show of amusement. The angel turned his head and met Dean's eyes over his shoulder. Eyes which were normally already a piercing blue were back-lit with an ethereal glow. "Those wounds do not translate well to this plane. They are not as severe in my true form as they tend to appear in this one. They are recent. They will heal."

"And the burns?"

Castiel hesitated before he said: "They will not. Angels cannot recover from hellfire."

Dean recoiled, ripping his hand away, feet jerking him backward. He had known. He had known the second he saw those patches of ruined feathers. "God_damnit_, Cas!" Dean howled.

Castiel spun around, his wings folding in and pulling together behind his back. The angel's tight fingers closed around Dean's wrist with a force that stilled the hunter.

Dean channeled Castiel's momentum and turned it on him with a desperate rage. "How do you even look at me? How can you even stand to be _near_ me?"

"Dean—"

"I ruined them," Dean cried. "You messed up your _wings_, Cas, your fucking _wings_ because of _me_. It wasn't worth it!"

Castiel's glowing eyes flared. He turned Dean's arm and manipulated his body around so that the hunter's back was to the angel's chest. Castiel hugged Dean from behind with a ferocious restraint. "Do not _dare_ tell me that it wasn't worth it," his gravely voice seethed behind Dean's ear.

Dean opened his mouth with the beginning of a retort, but his voice caught in his throat as he heard a sharp snapping _whoosh_ that cracked the air like a whip. He felt the muscular body behind him flex under the effort. The air shook and rippled the pooling water at their feet, but before him Dean could see the quavering reflection of Castiel's wings fanned out high and wide with purpose. In the starry shadow of night the mirrored wings looked much like they did in Pontiac that night, silhouettes cast onto a barn wall. They swallowed the light behind them with their darkness.

Castiel's hold around Dean loosened into a warm embrace.

"You wanted to see them, Dean, so see them," Castiel said, stretching his feathers further in display for Dean to see in the mirror. "I know that you must find them repulsive, but I will not allow you to blame yourself for something that is not your fault, for something I _love_. I sustained these burns bringing you into my life. Heaven stained my wings black to shame me when I fell, but I am _proud_. I will _not_ be ashamed, not for what I have done or what it has done to me. My wings tell our story. I cannot regret anything that has given me you."

Dean warmed, his heart swelling at the adoring words that Castiel would never say if he did not fully understand and mean them, but the grief, the self-disgust still shook him. Dean's hands found Castiel's, the angel holding him much the same as Dean had held him earlier on the Impala. He turned his head to look back at Castiel, chin to shoulder. Dean's eyes locked on the vibrant angelic blue not inches away. His breath hitched. His eyes darted away in mortal deference, but in doing so they caught sight of Castiel's wings drawing in, feathers fanning together and folding down.

Dean forced himself to bring his eyes back to Castiel's striking stare. "They're not… _repulsive_," Dean said the word as if it pained him. "Cas, they're gorgeous."

Castiel's eyes widened and narrowed in one swift expression. He dropped a kiss on Dean's shoulder in what seemed to be an afterthought. He flicked his eyes up at Dean, blessedly close, his lips still pressed to the trench coat covering Dean's shoulder. "You find them acceptable?"

Dean gave one of Castiel's hands a squeeze. "They're perfect."

The angel whimpered and coaxed Dean to turn back around. Castiel closed his eyes and pressed their foreheads together. Dean relaxed into the intimate gesture but flinched in surprise when he felt Castiel's wings wrap around his back. They engulfed him and shadowed him with warm black feathers that had a softness Dean hadn't even imagined could exist. The tips of the wings tickled the wet ground.

Dean lifted his hand to the wing that wrapped around his side and brushed his fingertips reverently down the length of a feather. Castiel shivered, his wings trembled.

"You were worth it," Castiel whispered. "You're worth everything, Dean."

The wings hugged Dean tighter and Castiel's arms found the hunter's hips inside the trench coat, urging him closer.

"Don't leave yet," Dean said, voice ragged with emotion and desperate with want. "Stay with me a little longer."

Dean lost his fingers in the downy feathers and the angel gasped. With a sea of glittering stars above them and their feet in a shimmering pool of mirrored light, the hunter captured Castiel's breath with a kiss.

"I will," Castiel said. "For you, I will."


End file.
